New Canaan school board rejects start times plan b

By Grace Duffield

Updated
8:51 am EDT, Wednesday, April 8, 2020

Superintendent of New Canaan Public Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi recently explained the district’s budget to the town’s Board of Selectmen flanked by Board of Education Chairman Katrina Parkhill in New Canaan Town Hall. K-12 school buildings in the state of Connecticut, such as those in New Canaan, are closed for the remainder of this academic year because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Connecticut’s Gov. Ned Lamont. Adding four days off, the Board of Education voted unanimously to revise the 2019-20 school year calendar at a recent virtual meeting.

Superintendent of New Canaan Public Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi recently explained the district’s budget to the town’s Board of Selectmen flanked by Board of Education Chairman Katrina Parkhill in New Canaan

Superintendent of New Canaan Public Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi recently explained the district’s budget to the town’s Board of Selectmen flanked by Board of Education Chairman Katrina Parkhill in New Canaan Town Hall. K-12 school buildings in the state of Connecticut, such as those in New Canaan, are closed for the remainder of this academic year because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to Connecticut’s Gov. Ned Lamont. Adding four days off, the Board of Education voted unanimously to revise the 2019-20 school year calendar at a recent virtual meeting.

Superintendent of New Canaan Public Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi recently explained the district’s budget to the town’s Board of Selectmen flanked by Board of Education Chairman Katrina Parkhill in New Canaan

Educators used such words as “offensive,” while saying they were “irked” and “shocked,” after another $1.14 million was cut from the school budget by Town Council — money they had hoped to use for later start times.

School officials wanted to dispel any suggestions that other bus route scenarios for later start times were possible to allow students to sleep more. They discussed the budget and the lack of viable scenarios at the Board of Education meeting on Monday, April 6.

“I will tell you when you are making whole systems change you don’t try to do it in a couple of months,” Superintendent Bryan Luizzi said.

“I think it would be a mistake for us to try to force something through that is sub-optimal,” Board Member Brendan Hayes said.

The Board of Education was still reeling from the decision by Town Council to lop off $1.143 million from the 2020-21 budget, leaving it at $90.99 million, by an 8-4 decision, on Thursday April 2.

“It really irked me,” Hayes said.

“Honestly I was shocked,” Secretary Jennifer Richardson said.

“I just view this as truly offensive, cutting our budget $1.4 million [actually $1.14 million] and then saying, ‘We really love what you are doing in New Canaan Public Schools, keep doing it.’ You can’t say that in the same breath. If you love what we’re doing in New Canaan Public Schools then support the New Canaan Public Schools,” Hayes said.

Neither Town Council or the Board of Finance have the authority to remove line items in the budget, but only have the right to reduce the whole school budget. School officials say the amount of reduction is too deep to have money leftover for start times.

Town Council made the cut after the Board of Finance had removed $578,136 from the operating budget for health insurance, so a total of $1,721,136 was removed from the plan proposed by the Board of Education. The finance board also took $175,000 out of the school capital budget.

The 2020-21 original school budget had included $954,521, with $221,191 for additional staffing, certified and non-certified; and $733,498 in transportation costs for seven more buses to reschedule school starts times this coming September.

“We have looked at 14 different scenarios,” Luizzi said. Except from the one they had chosen, “We just determined that trade offs on each one were really more than we were willing to make on behalf of the kids.”

Currently, the first tier transports high school students the middle school seventh and eighth graders to kickoff their school day at 7:30 a.m.; tier two takes South School pupils and middle school fifth and sixth graders to start school at 8:15 a.m.; a third tier takes students to West School and East School to begin their day at 9:05 a.m.

During time set aside for public comments, Heather Moore suggested the board relook at scenarios the board had once considered. “There is a way to do this at little or no cost and it changes very little from the original plan. If we move East or West Schools to the third tier with fifth and sixth grades, we achieve the same goals.”

“Everything comes at a cost, even a flip of tiers, if you look to move the times, that one was $300,00, that was at the best case scenario,” Luizzi said.

“Unfortunately there are no magical answers,” since the scenario that was suggested, “is still at a cost of $300,000. Just given how tight and lean our budget is, that will still mean cutting teachers and programs. I am dismayed to say this: We can’t move forward on later start times,” Board Member Sheri West said.

“I also know that it takes time. It takes time to develop the routes. It takes time to develop them, test them, model them, run the runs,” and “here we are April 6,” Luizzi said.

After three years, “we feel pretty confident that with all the constraints, we aren’t going to be able to will them away. The speed limits, where the kids live and number of buses and times all stay constant,” Luizzi said.

The later start times would have meant elementary schools would start at 7:50 a.m., seventh through 12th grades would start at 8:30 a.m. and the fifth and sixth graders would begin at 9:15 a.m.

Town Council members Mark Grzymski, Sven Englund, Tom Butterworth and Robin Bates-Mason voted against the cut to school budget.